The comedy series “Life’s too short” from some years back, starring Warwick Davis, raised awareness of the daily trials and tribulations encountered by persons of restricted growth. Perhaps remarkably, over a hundred years ago, a pupil described by a classmate as “having the misfortune of being a dwarf”, became the Senior Prefect, or (at a time when the school was not co-educational), Head Boy. 

Whether this suggests that PGS had a very progressive attitude to equal rights in a less enlightened world, or if the lad more than made up for his lack of height with a natural authority and presence, is not known – but what little evidence there is suggests it was a bit of both.  

John Alexander White was born in 1902, a week after the coronation of Edward VII. His parents, Charles, a retired Royal Navy Chief Carpenter, and Cecilia, raised the family in Worsley Road near Elm Grove, a short walk away from the old school (now the Upper Junior).  

White was admitted to the school in 1910 and in his first year won a prize for Latin. He became one of the youngest members of the Debating Society and his regular attendance was held up as an example to others, though he rarely contributed to the debates. During the First World War the Debating Society held a mock trial of a suspected German spy and White played “a page boy in the prisoner’s employ” who gave incriminating evidence that the accused often received visits by “men of a foreign appearance” and letters bearing a foreign post-mark. Three years later, at the age of sixteen, he was praised for his acting in a scene from Aristophanes’scathing satire, “The Knights”, and in the following year was made Senior Prefect. 

This inspired appointment appears to have given White the confidence to get fully involved in the robust debates that took place in the library, and to exercise authority and maintain discipline when the masters were not around. A prefect’s duties at this time involved arriving at school early to unlock classrooms, patrolling the school corridors, stopping fights, adjudicating in pupil arguments and keeping discipline in a firm but fair manner. To carry out these duties amidst the constant ribbing, taunts and heckling that prefects traditionally endured would have demanded qualities of strong character and leadership. As Senior Prefect, John White clearly rose to the challenge. 

In April 1919, White’s maiden Debating Society proposal was “that this House considers that barrel organs are not musical”. He lost the debate, one of his opponents arguing that the barrel organ that was regularly played outside the school relieved the tedium of lessons.  

In another debate, his cautious defence of spiritualism was vigorously opposed by Arthur Darby Nock. Within ten years Nock was a famous classical scholar, author and Professor of the History of Religion at Harvard, so there was no shame in White’s defeat. 

A surviving school admission record states that White left PGS to work or study at St Bartholomew’s Hospital. Unfortunately, no trace has been found so far in surviving hospital records, so what happened to John White is a mystery, though it is hoped that the start in life provided by his schooling helped offset some of the prejudices and fears that afflicted society at the time.  

Sources:  

PGS Admission registers, The Portmuthian, PGS Debating Society minutes,  

“A Day in the Life of a Prefect” The Portmuthian, June 1911